12 Laguna Tollway Protesters Arrested

Twelve environmental activists, some of whom chained themselves to bulldozers, were arrested by Orange County sheriff’s deputies Wednesday during a second day of protests aimed at halting the grading of Laguna Canyon for a 17-mile tollway.

Protesters arrived at the site before dawn and, in a symbolic gesture, five tethered themselves to heavy earthmoving equipment with string, causing authorities to arrest them. Sheriff’s deputies also arrested four others who secured themselves to bulldozers with bicycle locks and three who impeded workers by clambering aboard the heavy equipment.

The protest, which involved 50 demonstrators, also snarled early morning commuter traffic on Laguna Canyon Road.

Even as the earthmoving resumed Wednesday, there was more action in the courts. U.S. District Judge Linda H. McLaughlin in Santa Ana denied a request for a temporary restraining order sought by Laguna Greenbelt Inc. in a last-ditch effort to stop the grading.

Greenbelt attorneys filed an appeal of McLaughlin’s decision with the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, requesting an emergency injunction to stop the bulldozing immediately.

“Our appeal says that the judge should have granted our motion because of the Endangered Species Act,” said Joel R. Reynolds, senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council in Los Angeles and the attorney for Laguna Greenbelt.

Late Wednesday afternoon Superior Court Judge Leonard Goldstein denied another request for a last-ditch injunction filed by Beth Leeds, who was among the demonstrators at Wednesday morning’s protest.

The arrests came a day after a federal appeals panel dissolved an injunction that had halted construction of the San Joaquin Hills tollway for 15 months. The tollway, being built by the Transportation Corridor Agencies to handle increased commuter traffic caused by population growth, will slice a wide swath through the environmentally sensitive canyon and seven cities in southern Orange County. Funding for the project has so far been unaffected by the county’s financial woes.

Environmentalists have fought the tollway for years, saying Laguna Canyon is a habitat for the threatened California gnatcatcher and one of the last pristine areas of the county.

Seven men and five women--some of whom had received civil disobedience training--were arrested Wednesday morning on charges of trespassing and placed in a Sheriff’s Department bus with their hands tied or handcuffed behind them.

Once freed from the bulldozers, the protesters were given the chance to leave without being arrested, but some refused, said Orange County Sheriff’s Sgt. K. Lovelady.

“They said they’d just as soon go to jail and make a statement,” Lovelady said. “We’re accommodating them.”

The arrested demonstrators were taken to the Sheriff’s Intake Release Center in Santa Ana, where they were booked, cited for trespassing and released, according to Orange County Sheriff’s Lt. Tom McCarthy. The maximum penalty for misdemeanor trespassing is six months in jail and a $1,000 fine.

Ann Christoph, who earlier this month relinquished her seat as Laguna Beach mayor after being defeated in the November election, looked on grimly as bulldozers gnawed at the hillsides.

“I felt I should be here,” she said.